We’re inviting you to read a very interesting piece by Andy Samu, published on the Disruption Banking website. In his work on Nasdaq, Samu presents how this New York-based stock exchange helps develop technology and supports “unicorns” – technological start-ups that were valued at $1 billion or above.
Samu also quotes Adena Friedman’s words, when the Nasdaq’s CEO presented the points of focus for the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations. She highlighted the importance of continuing the support for innovative technology solutions. Nasdaq is the first stock market in the world that is completely electronic, and as it operates globally (in Switzerland for example), it has become an exchange and tech company.
Adena Friedman claims, that the Nasdaq was founded based on the idea of people not needing any direct contact and share the same space to be included in the same community. The firm continues its policy after the coronavirus crisis hit.
The story of Nasdaq
Disruption Banking’s piece recalls the story of Zoom’s IPO from 2019 Philadelphia-based exchange. Nasdaq is also widely known for being the stock exchange with Fiserv or PayPal listed. It also operates in Vilnius and Philadelphia. Not everyone knows it, but it also has some Chinese firms listed too. In 2019, the 9F company – a Chinese financial service – has been registered on the Nasdaq list. Although it might seem progressive, recent China-oriented actions taken by the US officials may complicate this cooperation.
Phil Mackintosh, the Chief Economist of Nasdaq expresses his belief in the recovery of the IPO market, and he presents certain data to prove it is happening. Since the beginning of 2020, 76 new firms were brought to it. That added as much as “$22 billion in market capitalization”. Nasdaq itself is representing almost 65% of those companies (49 out of 76).
Nasdaq’s quick growth
Nasdaq has purchased eVestment in 2017, a company providing analytics widely implemented in asset managers’ work, and also by the experts in the field of investments, and owners of the assets. It allows them to facilitate their actions and provide useful information when needed for investment decisions.
Three years later it is an indispensable part of Nasdaq Financial Framework, but it also has managed to maintain its uniqueness. In recent years the Nasdaq family has grown, as different entities were added to it in the process – Quandl for instance.
Despite efficient development, Nasdaq has been focused on implementing the ESG Climate (EGS stands for Environmental, Social and Governance) and has launched an initiative by the name of Nasdaq ESG Footprint.
Further cooperations only help this initiative, and the Disruption Banking piece brings up a new partnership between Nasdaq and Nordea. The Nasdaq’s Head of European Data, James Mckeone, has expressed how beneficial this new tie-up is. Nordea, as one of the biggest European banks, also has a leading position when it comes to sustainable finance. It will help Nasdaq bring its ESG Footprint policy to an even broader range of investors.
Unicorns and chances Nasdaq creates for them
We have already established, that Nasdaq is a progressive company, which seems to be well-oriented on the newest trends, and has a real sixth sense in terms of choosing partnerships. The company not only invested a lot to provide technological solutions but also supports companies that produce online content. That way the Unicorns not only find a way to be listed on Nasdaq’s exchange but are also heavily invested by the firm. It applies not only to Unicorns – being companies valued at $1 billion or more, but also candidates to gaining this title in the future.
In his Disruption Banking piece, Andy Samu focuses on the matter of Nasdaq’s blockchain partnerships and recalls more of its exciting cooperations – for instance with Vice President of AWS Sales in Amazon Web Services, Fran Fallon. To check out his article and to get to know the Nasdaq unicorns better, we invite you to click the following link and read his whole text: https://disruptionbanking.com/2020/06/18/nasdaq-where-do-unicorns-go-to-become-famous/.